Thrawn Ascendancy Book 3: Lesser Evil
- Автор: Зан Тимоти
- Год: 2021
- Язык: английский
- Год: Random House
- ISBN: 9781473596580
- Жанр: Боевая фантастика
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And when a Mitth syndic’s dislike for an individual was greater than his loyalty to his family, things could get complicated very quickly.
Thurfian no doubt thought he was being subtle about his opposition toward Thrawn. But Thrass had seen the signs in Thurfian’s face and voice, and if he’d seen them it was likely others had, as well. Thrass didn’t know the source of the animosity, but in such things the usual culprit was simple personality differences.
The more immediate problem, at least from Thrass’s perspective, was that in this case he didn’t know whether Thurfian was hoping to vindicate Thrawn or indict him.
It was an important question, but largely irrelevant to the task that had been literally dropped on Thrass’s desk. He’d been charged with analyzing the data and finding the truth, and that was what he was going to do.
And if the truth showed Thrawn had violated his oath, then that was what Thrass’s report would say.
“What do you mean, nothing?” Thurfian demanded, glaring across the desk at Thrass. “There’s something on that ranging laser profile.”
“Yes, of course,” Thrass said hastily. “Forgive me for misspeaking. What I meant was that there’s nothing suspicious there.”
“Really,” Thurfian said, his tone gone icy. “You don’t find all those modulations in the carrier frequency suspicious?”
“To be perfectly honest, Syndic, I find them to be largely the product of Mid Captain Roscu’s fevered imagination,” Thrass said. If there was one thing he’d learned growing up amid Mitth family politics, it was to point all doubts and hazy claims at one of the other families. “The rapid fluctuations along the main laser frequency are indeed there, but their pattern doesn’t match up to any known encryption or open conversational pattern.”
“Did you check for conversations in different trade languages?” Thurfian asked. “Or did you just look for patterns in Cheunh?”
“I tried Taarja and Sy Bisti,” Thrass said, choosing his words carefully. This was the most critical part of his whole presentation. “I was about to move on to Minnisiat and Meese Caulf when I noticed that the laser’s modulator disk had been replaced shortly after the incident.”
Thurfian’s forehead creased slightly. “Which means …?”
“The modulator controls the laser’s frequency,” Thrass explained. “A ranging laser has to be able to work through different levels of dust, atmosphere, or solar wind, and its frequency has to be adjusted to compensate if it’s going to deliver accurate information to the ship’s gunners. It’s similar to how spectrum lasers work—”
“I don’t need a lecture on military equipment,” Thurfian interrupted brusquely. “What does replacing the modulator have to do with anything?”
“I looked it up,” Thrass said. “It appears that modulators can sometimes develop a sort of flutter that manifests as small, rapid frequency shifts, not unlike those Mid Captain Roscu noted and brought to the Council’s attention. The fact that the modulator was replaced after the incident strongly suggests it was suffering from this malfunction.”
“Strongly suggests?”
“Yes, sir,” Thrass said. Pointing at another family was good; pointing into the unknown was sometimes even better. “Unfortunately, there’s no way to know for certain whether or not the disk was faulty. If a piece of equipment can’t be fixed, it’s put into the recycler for materials recovery, and that’s the end of it. And while there’s a log entry for every piece of equipment that’s replaced or recalibrated, only the date and time are listed, not the person who did the actual work or even necessarily the reason it was replaced.”
“Why not?” Thurfian demanded. “Crew members should be accountable for their actions.”
“I’m sure they are,” Thrass said. “But since the crew leaders are the ones responsible for keeping their areas running, and since they’re supposed to confirm their crews’ work before logging the details, apparently over the years the Council decided that additional details would clog up the records and make it harder to search for anything meaningful.”
“Meaningful?” Thurfian all but spat out the word. “You’re telling me this isn’t meaningful?”
“I didn’t mean it that way, sir,” Thrass said, ducking his head in apology. “Please forgive my inexact choice of words.”
“There’s no excuse for verbal sloppiness, Syndic Thrass,” Thurfian ground out. “If you can’t learn precision, I suggest you ask to be demoted from syndic and returned to your previous position.”
“Again, my apologies,” Thrass said. And when the personal attacks began, he knew, the attacker had given up on the original goal.
“Don’t apologize,” Thurfian said. “Improve. That will be all.”
“Yes, Syndic.” Thrass stood up and turned toward the door—
“Could Senior Commander Thrawn have been the one who replaced the modulator?” Thurfian asked.
“I don’t know how or why he would,” Thrass said, putting puzzlement into his voice as he turned back to face the other. Again, a place to step carefully. “Bridge officers normally don’t visit that section of a warship.”
“He was down there during the incident,” Thurfian reminded him, a fresh hint of suspicion rising into his voice. “When exactly was that modulator replaced?”
“Fourteen hours after the Parala returned to hyperspace,” Thrass said. “Senior Commander Thrawn was duty officer on the bridge at the time.”
“I see,” Thurfian muttered, the suspicion fading into sullenness. “Very well. Dismissed.”
And just like that, it was over.
Thrass headed down the corridor back toward his office, keeping his expression neutral. Yes, the modulator swap had been logged fourteen hours after the incident; but that didn’t necessarily mean that was when the exchange had taken place. Yes, Thrawn was indeed on the bridge at the time; but it didn’t necessarily mean someone else might not have made the replacement at someone’s quiet request. Yes, Thrass had tried to match the laser modulation to two of the best-known trade languages; but other sections of the Parala’s log had stated that the Garwians first hailed the Chiss in Minnisiat, one of the two languages he’d carefully put to the end of the line.
Fortunately, Thurfian hadn’t thought to question any of those points, which had enabled Thrass to remain completely truthful while still blunting Thurfian’s latest attack on Thrawn.
How to walk that delicate line was yet another lesson he’d learned from family politics.
He frowned, a sudden thought occurring to him. He’d noted in Thurfian that personal antagonism toward an individual could be detrimental to family loyalty. But was the opposite also true? Could Thrass’s friendship with Thrawn be clouding his own loyalty to the family in exactly the same way?
He gave a little huff. No, of course not. Friendship and kinship were the whole basis of family, after all. Without those connections the structure would collapse into a mass of individuals striving against one another for personal gain. For that matter, hadn’t Patriarch Thooraki all but told him that on the day when he’d sent Thrass to beat back the Stybla’s attempt to rematch Thrawn?
Besides, loyalty to Thrawn was loyalty to the family. There were great things ahead of Thrawn, a future that would raise the Mitth to even greater heights than they enjoyed now. The Patriarch clearly saw it; and if a visionary like Thooraki recognized Thrawn’s potential, who was Thrass to say otherwise?